
YucaLandia

Mar 29, 2013, 8:03 AM
Post #1 of 121
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Any News on How SRE is Handling Citizenship Requests?
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There are a number of us out here who were anticipating applying for naturalized Mexican citizenship under the workable combination of the old pre-2011 INM Law and the current SRE rules, but now the Gob. rules have changed to a mixture of incompatible requirement. The existing SRE rules have been: ~ Stay in Mexico for at least 18 months of the last 24 months before applying for citizenship, (no more than 180 days outside of Mexico during the prior 2 years - as proven by the legible stamps in your passport); ~ Complete at least 4.5 years on an FM2/Inmigrante (=> the INM card that requires near full-time residency); and then ~ Apply for Citizenship with SRE, while you still had 6 months left on an INM permit. Well, since the new INM (SEGOB) law forces one to go to Residente Permanente after just 4 years of FM2/No Inmigrante/Residente Temporal, it makes a mess out of meeting for the existing SRE rule for completing 5 years on FM2/Inmigrante. A lawyer we have spoken to on this says to go ahead and get a Residente Permanente card, (to meet the 5 year requirement), and then we'll see what SRE does in the meantime. 4 does not equal 5... This makes practical sense, because the existing SRE rules allow the old Inmigrado card holders to apply for citizenship, and Inmigrado = Residente Permanente plus one year, or 2 years, or 3 years, or 4 years**
Where's the problem? If you live in Yucatan, the Merida INM office fortunately combines past FM3 years with current FM2 years to qualify applicants for Residente Permanente, where your aggregate of more than 4 years on FM2+FM3 qualifies you for Residente Permanente. **Consider a person who had 5 years on an FM3, and has just completed 1 year on an FM2. Under the current system, this person can never achieve the SRE required 5 years of FM2. Since they did not complete 5 years on an FM2/Inmigrante, SRE rules say that they definitely do not qualify for citizenship. This leaves the expat wanting citizenship in a bit of legal limbo, (purgatory?), because the applicant then has Residente Permanente with just 1 year on an FM2. ~ This means that to hit 5 years of official full time residency (FM2?) status, ... ? This is one example of how the new Residente Permanente is NOT equivalent to Inmigrado (regardless of the INM law's Transitorios statements). As a result, we have heard that SRE is sitting-on (not processing) recent Naturalized Citizenship applications as they wait for guidance (from the Legislature?). Logic would say applicants with just 1 year of FM2/Inmigrante completed, then likely have to complete 4 additional years of Residente Permanente to add to their prior 1 completed years of FM2, to meet the SRE requirements for an effective 5 years of full time residency? Has anyone heard expat reports of how this SRE process is working under new post-Nov. 8, 2012 INM rules? Also: How do breaks in the citizenship applicant's FM2/Inmigrante's permit affect how SRE actually handles real cases? .... (e.g. after 20 years in Mexico, friend allowed his FM2 to lapse last year, paid his fine, and continued on the same FM2 permit) steve post script: I will be applying for citizenship in the next 3 months, but I qualify as the legal spouse of a Mexicana, and have completed SRE's required 2 years of FM2/Inmigrante. I ask for insights and other people's experiences on behalf of friends. - Read-on MacDuff E-visit at http://yucalandia.com
(This post was edited by YucaLandia on Mar 29, 2013, 8:44 AM)
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